A Disabled Facilities Grant (DFG) is available to anyone in the UK who has been assessed and confirmed by a medical professional as having a permanent and substantial disability. Any person (adult, child, or young person) will need to be assessed by a Hampshire Adult or Children's Services Occupational Therapist (OT) as eligible to receive adaptations to their home in order for their needs to be met.
Havant Borough Council provides grants, up to the amount of £30,000 per applicant, to help disabled people to carry out essential adaptations to their homes so that they can live more or fully independently. This is a mandatory grant for work considered necessary and appropriate by an Occupational Therapist (OT) for your needs and reasonable and practicable depending on the condition and age of the property by the Havant Borough Council.
Work can include stairlifts, level access shower etc and ensuring homes are wheelchair accessible. It can include extending your home if there are no other ways of getting access to essential facilities.
If you are having difficulty living at home because of a disability, we may be able to help you to carry out essential adaptations so that you can continue to live independently. You can apply for a DFG if you own your own home, rent or live with your family.
In the first instance, a referral to Occupational Therapy Direct (OT Direct) is required. You can contact OT Direct by phoning.
OT Direct will arrange for an Occupational Therapist (OT) to contact you and/or visit you to assess your or family member’s need(s).
The Occupational Therapy Service will, if appropriate, refer you and liaise with Havant Borough Council who holds responsibility for administering the funding for a DFG.
The grant team will use the information provided in the OT’s referral to decide whether the requested adaptations meet the DFG criteria.
If your referral is reasonable and practicable, you will be contacted/sent a grant application form to complete with a preliminary test of resources and other documentation. Those documents must be return as soon as possible. This will allow us to inform you if you are legible for the grant as soon as possible. If you do not return the completed form within a specified period of time, the case may be closed.
We will request quotes from you for stair-lifts (straight or curved) and through floor lifts at this stage. Your allocated OT should be able to help you to obtain or obtain the quotes on your behalf from lift companies.
The timescale for this visit varies depending on the urgency or not of the referral. Your OT can advise you of the likely timescales.
The grants officer may complete a visit by themselves, or if the request is more complicated, the OT may attend with them. In complex cases, an architect/builder may also attend. The grant officer will determine how they can meet your identified needs in the most ‘practicable’ and ‘reasonable’ way, as specified in the Housing Construction and Regeneration Act 1996. In this piece of legislation, the term practicable relates specifically to the age and condition of your property.
The grants team receive a large volume of referrals and therefore have to try and consider the most cost-effective solution in each case, to enable them to help as many people as possible. The proposed scheme may not necessarily and always be your preferred option. In such cases, this can be discussed further with the grants officer and the OT.
If your referral is not approved, you can appeal the decision.